Given the context of patronage great painters and sculptors historically thrived in, it’s no wonder many masterpieces followed from religious exultation. Among them, undoubtedly, is Pietà, this embodiment of mother’s grief after the loss of her child.

Read on about a complex and picturesque painting which uses aerial perspective to cram into a single work tons of narratives – to include a plowman with a purse and dagger, wearing clothes that clearly would never be worn by a field worker; an inattentive shepherd with …